Not only are people behaving differently on mobiles than desktops, they’re also expecting different responses. eMarketer’s July 2012 Mobile Roundup notes that “the shift toward immediate ‘just in time’ information access means that marketers and content providers must meet demands for mobile-optimized content.” Responsive design has been the answer so far to multimodal users seeking immediately relevant, actionable, utilizable content.

It’s considered by many as a great achievement in website development but if you want my take, responsive design is most often the euphemism for stretching production so that, at best, the website won’t look broken or just ugly on smartphones and other devices. I’d argue that when you don’t develop specifically for mobile, that is, when you try to take web and artifact it into mobile rather than the other way around, you fail to fully leverage the platform. In short, you fail to win. I expect a lot of TL:DR at this point, but stick with me to follow the argument. Continue reading →

It was largely the week of the API for us.

Speaking of killer apps and creativity, something about virtual world hopping into real world engagement pretty much ensures virality on YouTube–4mm views and counting for this top-app, Angry Bird in a T-Mobile video:

Perhaps the title question is too narrow and should focus on industries Apps will disrupt beyond Media, and my prediction is that Apps will disrupt nearly everything from the way we consume and engage with brands and media to how we transact, visualize, congregate and curate our daily lives and loves. With that thunderous prediction let me offer a couple of windows into the Apps EcoSystem which Gartner predicts will become $58 Billion in a few years and conclude with some thoughts informing these predictions:

AppNation Conference in San Francisco this Wednesday and Thursday, April 27-28, promises to deliver the “State of the Art” view of the EcoSystem. Register to attend in person and catch full-benefit of networking with founders and leaders in this emerging space or follow the hashtag on twitter: #appnationconf

Spend an hour with Drew Ianni, AppNation Chairman and Founder, presenting his view from the top of the Apps Ecosystem. Former Wall Street and Jupiter Analyst as well as top guy at ad:tech, Drew created AppNation to provide the best and biggest conference for the space. You can catch his Briefing at Anthem San Francisco here:

And, here are the companion slides to the video:

Some additional thoughts to complement my prediction that Apps will disrupt nearly every business and consumer interaction:

As Drew points out the value chain is shifting from the hardware–although the most elegant hardware can win massive share as we’ve seen with the iPad and iPhone–to the software or Apps on these devices. This content spans devices and channels jumping from Social/Web to Mobile and PC/Tablets and eventually connected TVs. This shift has been swift and taken the most immediately associated/impacted industries by storm and surprise. PC veteran, Michael Dell, admitted yesterday that he didn’t see Tablets coming and PC-maker Acer reported 24% drop in sales as a result of tablet disruption. The primary utility for Tablets? Apps.

As a result of this consumer draw, we can anticipate new, creative business models and entertainment forms to emerge and become as large a part of popular culture as anything Hollywood has ever produced. And, of course, Hollywood may spawn and will appropriate these new entertain forms.

As we’ve seen with Social Media, consumer adoption and new behaviors will inspire enterprise adoption as well. So, my prediction started in the title with Media, the most obvious place for disruption as we see media transformed with superior features, connectivity and transaction abilities to change how we think about distribution and engagement with Print, Radio, TV and even the Internet media that came before Apps. In establishing a new medium and channel it’s important to emphasize this is about disruption not replacing or destroying. Incombent business models will have to evolve and embrace the new medium to survive and thrive in the disruption.

Will Apps have their own mass-events like the Oscars, Grammy’s, Cannes or Tony’s? They already have their own conference. Hope to catch you at AppNation this week and every year going forward. Cheers!

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Location based

Geolocation space is the one to watch right now, as impact, device-counts, networks, meta-data, distribution and applications continue to grow: – 5 Important New Trends in Location

This week we caught up with Ken Willner, CEO of Zumobi, at the AppNation conference. Zumobi builds mobile apps for media companies and marketers and also have built an ad network for in-App advertising. Ken’s got a great perspective earned from 15-years agency-side then in the senior marketing role at AT&T before taking up his current role. With millions of uniques a month over a wide variety of apps, we pressed Ken for some thoughts on what they’re seeing in the space. Here’s the interview:

Highlights:

How important Moms are in Apps category. Huge demand for creating content for that category

Smart-phone discussion: iPhone/iOS is still winning, but Android coming up fast

Two platform development simplicity part of what’s driving the market, but it’s been catalyzed by Apple–vertical integration of software, device, vision, etc. to create model that others can then replicate

What are you seeing out there? Either/or or And when it comes to Apps and device preferences?

Intoday’s Apple event announcing new product news around an entirely revamped iPod product line, re-formed AppleTV and other innovations, Steve Jobs shared some performance numbers across a variety of devices, platforms and markets. More than the features, the numbers interested me. Probably the biggest one is 160 million user accounts with 1-click buying ability. Here’s a run-down of those numbers: